University of Virginia Library

16. CHAPTER XVI.
WHICH GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF A VOLUNTARY AND AN INVOLUNTARY
VISIT OF SAM YATES TO NUMBER NINE.

Mr. Belcher followed up the acquaintance which he had
so happily made on New Year's Day with many of the leading
operators of Wall street, during the remainder of the winter,
and, by the careful and skillful manipulation of the minor
stocks of the market, not only added to his wealth by sure
and steady degrees, but built up a reputation for sagacity and
boldness. He struck at them with a strong hand, and gradually
became a recognized power on 'Change. He knew
that he would not be invited into any combinations until he
had demonstrated his ability to stand alone. He understood
that he could not win a leading position in any of the great
financial enterprises until he had shown that he had the skill
to manage them. He was playing for two stakes—present
profit and future power and glory; and he played with brave
adroitness.

During the same winter the work at Number Nine went on
according to contract. Mike Conlin found his second horse
and the requisite sled, and, the river freezing solidly and continuously,
he was enabled not only to draw the lumber to the
river, but up to the very point where it was to be used, and
where Jim and Mr. Benedict were hewing and framing their
timber, and pursuing their trapping with unflinching industry.
Number Ten was transformed into a stable, where Mike kept
his horses on the nights of his arrival. Two trips a week were
all that he could accomplish, but the winter was so long, and
he was so industrious, that before the ice broke up, everything

for the construction of the house had been delivered, even to
the bricks for the chimney, the lime for the plastering, and
the last clapboard and shingle. The planning, the chaffing,
the merry stories of which Number Nine was the scene that
winter, the grand, absorbing interest in the enterprise in
which these three men were engaged, it would be pleasant to
recount, but they may safely be left to the reader's imagination.
What was Sam Yates doing?

He lived up to the letter of his instructions. Finding himself
in the possession of an assured livelihood, respectably
dressed and engaged in steady employment, his appetite for
drink loosened its cruel hold upon him, and he was once more
in possession of himself. All the week long he was busy in
visiting hospitals, alms-houses and lunatic asylums, and in
examining their records and the mortuary records of the city.
Sometimes he presented himself at the doors of public institutions
as a philanthropist, preparing by personal inspection for
writing some book, or getting statistics, or establishing an
institution on behalf of a public benefactor. Sometimes he
went in the character of a lawyer, in search of a man who had
fallen heir to a fortune. He had always a plausible story to
tell, and found no difficulty in obtaining an entrance at all
the doors to which his inquisition led him. He was treated
everywhere so courteously that his self-respect was wonderfully
nourished, and he began to feel as if it were possible for him
to become a man again.

On every Saturday night, according to Mr. Belcher's command,
he made his appearance in the little basement-room of
the grand residence, where he was first presented to the reader.
On these occasions he always brought a clean record of what
he had done during the week, which he read to Mr. Belcher,
and then passed into that gentleman's hands, to be filed away
and preserved. On every visit, too, he was made to feel that
he was a slave. As his self-respect rose from week to week,
the coarse and brutal treatment of the proprietor was increased.
Mr. Belcher feared that the man was getting above

his business, and that, as the time approached when he might
need something very different from these harmless investigations,
his instrument might become too fine for use.

Besides the ministry to his self-respect which his labors
rendered, there was another influence upon Sam Yates that
tended to confirm its effects. He had in his investigations
come into intimate contact with the results of all forms of
vice. Idiocy, insanity, poverty, moral debasement, disease
in a thousand repulsive forms, all these had frightened and
disgusted him. On the direct road to one of these terrible
goals he had been traveling. He knew it, and, with a shudder
many times repeated, felt it. He had been arrested in
the downward road, and, God helping him, he would never
resume it. He had witnessed brutal cruelties and neglect
among officials that maddened him. The professional indifference
of keepers and nurses towards those who, if vicious,
were still unfortunate and helpless, offended and outraged all
of manhood there was left in him.

One evening, early in the spring, he made his customary
call upon Mr. Belcher, bringing his usual report. He had
completed the canvass of the city and its environs, and had
found no testimony to the death or recent presence of Mr.
Benedict. He hoped that Mr. Belcher was done with him,
for he saw that his brutal will was the greatest obstacle to his
reform. If he could get away from his master, he could
begin life anew; for his professional brothers, who well remembered
his better days, were ready to throw business into his
hands, now that he had become himself again.

“I suppose this ends it,” said Yates, as he read his report,
and passed it over into Mr. Belcher's hands.

“Oh, you do!”

“I do not see how I can be of further use to you.”

“Oh, you don't!”

“I have certainly reason to be grateful for your assistance,
but I have no desire to be a burden upon your hands. I
think I can get a living now in my profession.”

“Then we've found that we have a profession, have we?
We've become highly respectable.”

“I really don't see what occasion you have to taunt me.
I have done my duty faithfully, and taken no more than my
just pay for the labor I have performed.”

“Sam Yates, I took you out of the gutter. Do you know
that?”

“I do, sir.”

“Did you ever hear of my doing such a thing as that
before?”

“I never did.”

“What do you suppose I did it for?”

“To serve yourself.”

“You are right; and now let me tell you that I am not
done with you yet, and I shall not be done with you until I
have in my hands a certificate of the death of Paul Benedict,
and an instrument drawn up in legal form, making over to
me all his right, title and interest in every patented invention
of his which I am now using in my manufactures. Do you
hear that?”

“I do.”

“What have you to say to it? Are you going to live up
to your pledge, or are you going to break with me?”

“If I could furnish such an instrument honorably, I would
do it.”

“Hm! I tell you, Sam Yates, this sort of thing won't do.”

Then Mr. Belcher left the room, and soon returned with a
glass and a bottle of brandy. Setting them upon the table,
he took the key from the outside of the door, inserted it upon
the inside, turned it, and then withdrew it, and put it in his
pocket. Yates rose and watched him, his face pale, and his
heart thumping at his side like a tilt-hammer.

“Sam Yates,” said Mr. Belcher, “you are getting altogether
too virtuous. Nothing will cure you but a good, old-fashioned
drunk. Dip in, now, and take your fill. You can
lie here all night if you wish to.”

Mr. Belcher drew the cork, and poured out a tumblerful
of the choice old liquid. Its fragrance filled the little room.
It reached the nostrils of the poor slave, who shivered as if
an ague had smitten him. He hesitated, advanced toward
the table, retreated, looked at Mr. Belcher, then at the
brandy, then walked the room, then paused before Mr. Belcher,
who had coolly watched the struggle from his chair.
The victim of this passion was in the supreme of torment.
His old thirst was roused to fury. The good resolutions of
the preceding weeks, the moral strength he had won, the motives
that had come to life within him, the promise of a better
future, sank away into blank nothingness. A patch of fire
burned on either cheek. His eyes were bloodshot.

“Oh God! Oh God!” he exclaimed, and buried his face
in his hands.

“Fudge!” said Mr. Belcher. “What do you make an ass
of yourself for?”

“If you'll take these things out of the room, and see that
I drink nothing to-night, I'll do anything. They are hell and
damnation to me. Don't you see? Have you no pity on
me? Take them away!”

Mr. Belcher was surprised, but he had secured the promise
he was after, and so he coolly rose and removed the offensive
temptation.

Yates sat down as limp as if he had had a sunstroke. After
sitting a long time in silence, he looked up, and begged for
the privilege of sleeping in the house. He did not dare to
trust himself in the street until sleep had calmed and strengthened
him.

There was a lounge in the room, and, calling a servant,
Mr. Belcher ordered blankets to be brought down. “You
can sleep here to-night, and I will see you in the morning,”
said he, rising, and leaving him without even the common
courtesy of a “good-night.”

Poor Sam Yates had a very bad night indeed. He was
humiliated by the proof of his weakness, and maddened by

the outrage which had been attempted upon him and his good
resolutions. In the morning, he met Mr. Belcher, feeble and
unrefreshed, and with seeming acquiescence received his directions
for future work.

“I want you to take the road from here to Sevenoaks,
stopping at every town on the way. You can be sure of this:
he is not near Sevenoaks. The whole county, and in fact
the adjoining counties, were all ransacked to find him. He
cannot have found asylum there; so he must be either between
here and Sevenoaks, or must have gone into the woods beyond.
There's a trapper there, one Jim Fenton. He may have come
across him in the woods, alive or dead, and I want you to go
to his camp and find out whether he knows anything. My
impression is that he knew Benedict well, and that Benedict
used to hunt with him. When you come back to me, after a
faithful search, with the report that you can find nothing of
him, or with the report of his death, we shall be ready for
decisive operations. Write me when you have anything to
write, and if you find it necessary to spend money to secure
any very desirable end, spend it.”

Then Mr. Belcher put into the hands of his agent a roll of
bank-notes, and armed him with a check that might be used
in case of emergency, and sent him off.

It took Yates six long weeks to reach Sevenoaks. He labored
daily with the same faithfulness that had characterized his
operations in the city, and, reaching Sevenoaks, he found
himself for a few days free from care, and at liberty to resume
the acquaintance with his early home, where he and Robert
Belcher had been boys together.

The people of Sevenoaks had long before heard of the fall
of Sam Yates from his early rectitude. They had once been
proud of him, and when he left them for the city, they expected
to hear great things of him. So when they learned
that, after entering upon his profession with brilliant promise,
he had ruined himself with drink, they bemoaned him for a
while, and at last forgot him. His relatives never mentioned

him, and when, well dressed, dignified, self-respectful, he appeared
among them again, it was like receiving one from
the dead. The rejoicing of his relatives, the cordiality of his
old friends and companions, the reviving influences of the
scenes of his boyhood, all tended to build up his self-respect,
reinforce his strength, and fix his determinations for a new
life.

Of course he did not make known his business, and of
course he heard a thousand inquiries about Mr. Belcher, and
listened to the stories of the proprietor's foul dealings with
the people of his native town. His own relatives had been
straitened or impoverished by the man's rascalities, and the
fact was not calculated to strengthen his loyalty to his employer.
He heard also the whole story of the connection of
Mr. Belcher with Benedict's insanity, of the escape of the
latter from the poor-house, and of the long and unsuccessful
search that had been made for him.

He spent a delightful week among his friends in the old
village, learned about Jim Fenton and the way to reach him,
and on a beautiful spring morning, armed with fishing tackle,
started from Sevenoaks for a fortnight's absence in the woods.
The horses were fresh, the air sparkling, and at mid-afternoon
he found himself standing by the river-side, with a row of ten
miles before him in a birch canoe, whose hiding-place Mike
Conlin had revealed to him during a brief call at his house.
To his unused muscles it was a serious task to undertake, but
he was not a novice, and it was entered upon deliberately and
with a prudent husbandry of his power of endurance. Great
was the surprise of Jim and Mr. Benedict, as they sat eating
their late supper, to hear the sound of the paddle down the
river, and to see approaching them a city gentleman, who,
greeting them courteously, drew up in front of their cabin,
took out his luggage, and presented himself.

“Where's Jim Fenton?” said Yates.

“That's me. Them as likes me calls me Jim, and them as
don't like me—wall, they don't call.”

“Well, I've called, and I call you Jim.”

“All right; let's see yer tackle,” said Jim.

Jim took the rod that Yates handed to him, looked it over,
and then said: “When ye come to Sevenoaks ye didn't think
o' goin' a fishin'. This 'ere tackle wasn't brung from the
city, and ye ain't no old fisherman. This is the sort they
keep down to Sevenoaks.”

“No,” said Yates, flushing; “I thought I should find near
you the tackle used here, so I didn't burden myself.”

“That seems reasomble,” said Jim, “but it ain't. A
trout's a trout anywhere, an' ye hain't got no reel. Ye never
fished with anything but a white birch pole in yer life.”

Yates was amused, and laughed. Jim did not laugh. He
was just as sure that Yates had come on some errand, for
which his fishing tackle was a cover, as that he had come at
all. He could think of but one motive that would bring the
man into the woods, unless he came for sport, and for sport
he did not believe his visitor had come at all. He was not
dressed for it. None but old sportsmen, with nothing else to
do, ever came into the woods at that season.

“Jim, introduce me to your friend,” said Yates, turning
to Mr. Benedict, who had dropped his knife and fork, and sat
uneasily witnessing the meeting, and listening to the conversation.

“Well, I call 'im Number Ten. His name's Williams;
an' now if ye ain't too tired, perhaps ye'll tell us what they
call ye to home.”

“Well, I'm Number Eleven, and my name's Williams, too.”

“Then, if yer name's Williams, an' ye're Number 'leven,
ye want some supper. Set down an' help yerself.”

Before taking his seat, Yates turned laughingly to Mr.
Benedict, shook his hand, and “hoped for a better acquaintance.”

Jim was puzzled. The man was no ordinary man; he was
good-natured; he was not easily perturbed; he was there
with a purpose, and that purpose had nothing to do with sport.

After Yates had satisfied his appetite with the coarse food
before him, and had lighted his cigar, Jim drove directly at
business.

“What brung ye here?” said he.

“A pair of horses and a birch canoe.”

“Oh! I didn't know but 'twas a mule and a bandanner
hankercher,” said Jim; “and whar be ye goin' to sleep to-night?”

“In the canoe, I suppose, if some hospitable man doesn't
invite me to sleep in his cabin.”

“An' if ye sleep in his cabin, what be ye goin' to do to-morrer?”

“Get up.”

“An' clear out?”

“Not a bit of it.”

“Well, I love to see folks make themselves to home; but
ye don't sleep in no cabin o' mine till I know who ye be, an'
what ye're arter.”

“Jim, did you ever hear of entertaining angels unaware?”
and Yates looked laughingly into his face.

“No, but I've hearn of angels entertainin' theirselves on
tin-ware, an' I've had 'em here.”

“Do you have tin peddlers here?” inquired Yates, looking
around him.

“No, but we have paupers sometimes,” and Jim looked
Yates directly in the eye.

“What paupers?”

“From Sevenoaks.”

“And do they bring tin-ware?”

“Sartin they do; leastways, one on 'em did, an' I never
seen but one in the woods, an' he come here one night tootin'
on a tin horn, an' blowin' about bein' the angel Gabrel. Do
you see my har?”

“Rather bushy, Jim.”

“Well, that's the time it come up, an' it's never been tired
enough to lay down sence.”

“What became of Gabriel?”

“I skeered 'im, and he went off into the woods pertendin'
he was tryin' to catch a bullet. That's the kind o' ball I
allers use when I have a little game with a rovin' angel that
comes kadoodlin' round me.”

“Did you ever see him afterward?” inquired Yates.

“Yes, I seen him. He laid down one night under a tree,
an' he wasn't called to breakfast, an' he never woke up. So
I made up my mind he'd gone to play angel somewheres else,
an' I dug a hole an' put 'im into it, an' he hain't never
riz, if so be he wasn't Number 'leven, an' his name was
Williams.”

Yates did not laugh, but manifested the most eager interest.

“Jim,” said he, “can you show me his bones, and swear
to your belief that he was an escaped pauper?”

“Easy.”

“Was there a man lost from the poor-house about that
time?”

“Yes, an' there was a row about it, an' arterward old
Buffum was took with knowin' less than he ever knowed afore.
He always did make a fuss about breathin', so he give it up.”

“Well, the man you buried is the man I'm after.”

“Yes, an' old Belcher sent ye. I knowed it. I smelt the
old feller when I heern yer paddle. When a feller works for
the devil it ain't hard to guess what sort of a angel he is. Ye
must feel mighty proud o' yer belongins.”

“Jim, I'm a lawyer; it's my business. I do what I'm
hired to do.”

“Well,” responded Jim, “I don't know nothin' about
lawyers, but I'd rather be a natural born cuss nor a hired
one.”

Yates laughed, but Jim was entirely sober. The lawyer
saw that he was unwelcome, and that the sooner he was out
of Jim's way, the better that freely speaking person would
like it. So he said quietly:

“Jim, I see that I am not welcome, but I bear you no ill-will.

Keep me to-night, and to-morrow show me this man's
bones, and sign a certificate of the statements you have made
to me, and I will leave you at once.”

The woodsman made no more objection, and the next
morning, after breakfast, the three men went together and
found the place of the pauper's burial. It took but a few
minutes to disinter the skeleton, and, after a silent look at it,
it was again buried, and all returned to the cabin. Then the
lawyer, after asking further questions, drew up a paper certifying
to all the essential facts in the case, and Jim signed it.

“Now, how be ye goin' to get back to Sevenoaks?” inquired
Jim.

“I don't know. The man who brought me in is not to
come for me for a fortnight.”

“Then ye've got to huff it,” responded Jim.

“It's a long way.”

“Ye can do it as fur as Mike's, an' he'll be glad to git
back some o' the hundred dollars that old Belcher got out of
him.”

“The row and the walk will be too much.”

“I'll take ye to the landing,” said Jim.

“I shall be glad to pay you for the job,” responded Yates.

“An' ef ye do,” said Jim, “there'll be an accident, an'
two men'll get wet, an' one on 'em'll stan' a chance to be
drownded.”

“Well, have your own way,” said Yates.

It was not yet noon, and Jim hurried off his visitor. Yates
bade good-bye to Benedict, jumped into Jim's boat, and was
soon out of sight down the stream. The boat fairly leaped
through the water under Jim's strong and steady strokes, and
it seemed that only an hour had passed when the landing was
discovered.

They made the whole distance in silence. Jim, sitting at
his oars, with Yates in the stern, had watched the lawyer with
a puzzled expression. He could not read him. The man
had not said a word about Benedict. He had not once pronounced

his name. He was evidently amused with something,
and had great difficulty in suppressing a smile. Again and
again the amused expression suffused the lawyer's face, and
still, by an effort of will, it was smothered. Jim was in torture.
The man seemed to be in possession of some great
secret, and looked as if he only waited an opportunity beyond
observation to burst into a laugh.

“What the devil ye thinkin' on?” inquired Jim at last.

Yates looked him in the eyes, and replied coolly:

“I was thinking how well Benedict is looking.”

Jim stopped rowing, holding his oars in the air. He was
dumb. His face grew almost livid, and his hair seemed to
rise and stand straight all over his head. His first impulse
was to spring upon the man and throttle him, but a moment's
reflection determined him upon another course. He let his
oars drop into the water, and then took up the rifle, which he
always carried at his side. Raising it to his eye, he said:

“Now, Number 'leven, come an' take my seat. Ef ye
make any fuss, I'll tip ye into the river, or blow yer brains
out. Any man that plays traitor with Jim Fenton, gits traitor's
fare.”

Yates saw that he had made a fatal mistake, and that it was
too late to correct it. He saw that Jim was dangerously excited,
and that it would not do to excite him further. He
therefore rose, and with feigned pleasantry, said he should be
very glad to row to the landing.

Jim passed him and took a seat in the stern of the boat.
Then, as Yates took up the oars, Jim raised his rifle, and,
pointing it directly at the lawyer's breast, said:

“Now, Sam Yates, turn this boat round.”

Yates was surprised in turn, bit his lips, and hesitated.

“Turn this boat round, or I'll fix ye so't I can see through
ye plainer nor I do now.”

“Surely, Jim, you don't mean to have me row back.
haven't harmed you.”

“Turn this boat round, quicker nor lightnin'.”

“There, it's turned,” said Yates, assuming a smile.

“Now row back to Number Nine.”

“Come, Jim,” said Yates, growing pale with vexation and
apprehension, “this fooling has gone far enough.”

“Not by ten mile,” said Jim.

“You surely don't mean to take me back. You have no
right to do it. I can prosecute you for this.”

“Not if I put a bullet through ye, or drown ye.”

“Do you mean to have me row back to Number Nine?”

“I mean to have you row back to Number Nine, or go to
the bottom leakin',” responded Jim.

Yates thought a moment, looked angrily at the determined
man before him, as if he were meditating some rash experiment,
and then dipped his oars and rowed up-stream.

Great was the surprise of Mr. Benedict late in the afternoon
to see Yates slowly rowing toward the cabin, and landing
under cover of Jim's rifle, and the blackest face that he
had ever seen above his good friend's shoulders.